Public prosecution has handed over the case file of the terrorist organization linked to the al-Qaeda to the Cairo Court of Appeal.
The case includes 68 of the most dangerous terrorists in Egypt, led by Mohamed al-Zawahiri, the brother of al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri.
The defendants, of whom 50 are detained in Tora Prison pending trial, were formally informed of their charges, while prosecutors ordered the arrest of the other 18 fugitives.
Prosecutor General Hisham Barakat had charged the defendants with establishing and running a terrorist organization linked to al-Qaeda that targets state installations, the armed forces, the police and Coptic citizens so as to spread chaos and put the security of society at risk.
The file is more than 3,000 pages that include the interrogation sessions with the defendants, their confessions, technical reports about the arms, ammunition and laptops that were found in their possession, reports of public prosecutors that inspected their premises, investigations of security services, and testimonies of prosecution witnesses.
Prosecution witnesses of the National Security Agency said al-Zawahiri revived the Jihad terrorist organization, restructured it and linked it to extremist terrorist organizations in Egypt and abroad, which gave the members military training and taught them how to use firearms and manufacture improvised explosive devices. He also assigned certain defendants to go and fight in Syria and Iraq with the organization of the “Islamic State in Iraq and Greater Syria” (Daash).
Investigation revealed further that he ordered the elements he had sent to Daash to come back after President Mohamed Morsy was ousted as a result of mass demonstrations, and after the sit-ins of Rabaa al-Adawiya and al-Nahda squares were dispersed, to carry out hostile operations against the army and the police. He also instructed them to provide enough firearms and explosive material to carry out those operations.
The sixth defendant, Fawzi Saif Eddin, provided financial support, explosive material and premises for the organization to use, while defendant Omar Abdel Khalek commanded a cell of members that gained field experience in military and terrorist operations within the ranks of Daash.
The file says the defendants confessed to renting farms for the members of the organization to undergo training on how to use firearms and manufacture explosives, and other confessions about terrorist operations against police and army forces, property of Coptic Christians and planning for assassinations.
The computers contained pictures of terrorist attacks against army vehicles carried out by Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis, the Sinai-based terrorist group, and the bombing of the gas lines, as well as lists of names and telephone numbers of police officers, plans to blow up churches and storm police stations, and a scheme to break into the Minya governorate headquarters and the security directories.
Edited translation from MENA
